Thursday, August 16

this morning i awoke with a giddy feeling inside, my giddy feeling is due to 2 things.

giddy thing 1:

last night i went for a 'pottle on a whim' to the thrift store. now interestingly "how interestingly Tif?" i hear you ask, well very interestingly indeedy say i. interestingly i had planned a pottle to the thrift store the eve before but the day ran away with me and i was unable to muster the energy. however last night i cooked dinner early and after which i noted there were several hours left till closing and also very conveniently we had run out of milk. i announced a run to the grocery store was in order and that was that. i do believe upon reflection, the thrifty gods were at work.

for a moment i was distracted by a large (extremely large, as in life size) chalk-ware forsaken soul cat. i was strangely attracted to its slightly evil eyes and pondered as to whether it would like to live in Gladys. i pushed the evil eyed cat to the back of the shelve so others may pass on by and went upon my way, thinking i would swing on back again later. and so i pottled quite happily amongst the shelves of despair. i noted rather a large gathering of thrifters were going about their business. i did the usual once up and down the shoe aisle in-case a pair of clogs were looking for me and as usual, they weren't. haven't found me in over 2 years thats how scarce a pair of secondhand peachy clogs can be. thought i would have a mosey at the boots, once again, a rarity to find any of worth. as i was just about to turn away i noted a tiny wooden tip of a 'cloggy soul' sticking out, hanging behind another pair of unloved soles.

the very roundy tippity tip which stopped me in my 'pottling on a whim' tracks

i gulped, i noted a thrifter close by, too close for comfort and right in front of what i believed could be the cloggy find of the century. my heart quickened, i had not choice but to lean in front of her saying "pardon my reach" (a term learnt in a pizza restaurant when the server kept on saying it every time he put something on our table and now adopted by us for certain circumstances such as this moment). as i lent forward and touched the buttery soft leather i gasped. not out loud of course, no sirree that would never do, i kept it inside due to not wishing to draw attention to my find just yet. i fell instantly head over heels in love, that moment for sure, a chorus of angels appeared. could it be they were in my size, surely surely if ever a pair of cloggy boots were meant to be. as i placed my foot inside the boot i knew at that moment how Cinderella felt. i was going to go to the ball after all, i was going to do a cloggy dance the likes of which have never been seen before.

scalloped edging made my knees go weak

embroidered details left me a little breathless

i finished up my pottle with an intense filling of giddiness which had left me so full of joy i wished to cry. i told myself to get a grip Tif, really get a grip. i could not believe others were not overcome too by my find but they were not, they were intent on finding their own bit of secondhand joy.

so i took 'my find' home, to share with my lads of three (oh such lucky lads). i will give my man his dues, indeed i will, for he tried really hard to understand the monumental-ness of this peachy find. i noted to him, despite the soft worn in look of the uppers, the unders had not been worn thus my expertise tells me, they are nearly new.

soles looking peachy to me thus 'nearly new' without a doubt

since bringing home my cloggy boots i have done what i always do with any fabby find, i have placed it where i can see it and admire it at all times. i have done this for donkeys years.

"oh cloggy boots, oh cloggy boots, how fabby is your clogginess"

alas and alack though, i left the thrift store looking like a cat who got the cream but i did not have an evil eyed cat by my side... my thoughts are, if he's still there next time, then he is meant to be my evil eyed cat

giddy thing 2:

if you are still there? "hello hello". this is well worth a bit of giddy. i would say a cup and a half of giddy to me. earlier in the year my path crossed with the lovely Jennette and in doing so, we struck up a most grand friendship and one i am so chuffed to have. Jennette is quite the curator of curiosities and she has an emporium filled to the rafters with vintage finds so beautifully displayed i could spend all day just looking. well on saturday lucky old me is getting to do just that. i will be there the 'whole live long day' from 12 to 6 working behind the counter! i cannot believe this position of high responsibility has been given to me. i am overcome with giddiness mixed with nervousness at working out in the world again. tomorrow i will bring you some peachy photos of Jennette's fine emporium Smashing Rubbish, in the meantime you can find out where her store is by visiting this spiffy facebook page for the nitty gritty.

weather bug has informed me it will be tres hot, but this will not deter me from wearing my fine new fabby cloggy friends along with a home made frock to bring me good luck, and it is my hope you may care to pottle my way and come and spend a few happy moments browsing the smashing shelves of Jennette's fine emporium. i promise to do my utmost best at being very knowledgeable about things for sale and chit chatting if you so wish. however i should add a little side note to my invitation, you will wish to bring your piggy bank along too, for its near on impossible to cross the threshold to Smashing Rubbish without parting with a few pennies.

photos tomorrow of Smashing Rubbish delights, later on, after i have had my 'shop training' where i will be wearing a badge which says 'in training with lovely clog boots on feet, please be nice'

Tif :)

footynote: i have told little olive it is way too hot today to play hide and seek... after counting to 23 and a half, she fell asleep

Tuesday, August 14

the past few weeks have past in a blur of shuffling, for the shed has undergone some serious shuffling. the sort of shuffling which requires all hands on deck or else they won't be fed. the massive shuffling is coming to an end and in the aftermath is a trail of piles. piles still looking for a home, lost on their way to new surroundings. every morning i arise with high hopes i will tackle one of these piles but alas, i get sidetracked by others who call my name.

vintage wallpaper doing a grand job of staying where i put it

my side tracking ways have been spent with a roll of vintage wallpaper and several old lampshades. where my old studio once stood, (which relocated upstairs to Our #1's old bedroom over a year ago, only to be relocated once again in the recent 'grand shuffling event of 2012 at mossy shed') was a blank page waiting to be decorated. it had for well over a year not been a blank page but covered in 'bits and bobs' who had babies and spread their 'bits and bobs-ness' around the corner towards the kitchen. before i winged it over the pond earlier in the summer i downsized my 'bits and bobs' wall to make a 'mini me bits and bobs' wall in the hallway, thus leaving a blank canvas or page if you will. (if you have followed that, then a jolly good 'well done' to you)

any old trimming or ribbon will do the job nicely

so papering was done with a wing and a prayer due to my iffy wallpapering skills and then i set to work making a few 'lurvely lampshade lanterns'. i do like a cluster of dingly dangly things and i do love lanterns and such like. armed with a few vintage frames with their covers removed (found as-is, or stripped by moi), a few faded paper lanterns, some strips of frayed fabric for wrapping, some trimmings and one left over christmas bauble, i got to work.

use frayed fabric to wrap around old frames and then use left over strips to string them altogether

hang paper lanterns outside for several days in the sun to fade their colours and add a vintage charm

original trimmings are worth saving when stripping the frame

i noted several things as i was lost in my lurvely lampshade lantern making moment. thing one: i do like nothing more than pottling about with leftover things to make other things come to life. thing two: if i had a bricks and mortar store i would make a whole gaggle of these sweeties to hang in the window. thing three: i could indeed still do so and hang them in the window of my old studio if it was not for the very inconvenient thing of having 6 foot lads and low ceilings in the shed. thing four: when did such a small detail ever stop me before.

i left some parts of the frame 'as-is'

other parts of the lampshade frames were wrapped in lace or frayed fabric

dingly dangly tassle made from pretty peachy trimmings

today as my 'lurvely lampshade lanterns' dingle dangle away, kindly placed in corners to avoid lads who may be short sighted i have several more things on my mind and plate (besides the piles which keep mocking me). thing one: going to the eye dr after last weeks vision test to order my new lenses knowing full well the transition to wearing them could drive me to not get out of bed for a very long time and thing two: buying some sticky price labels for the very thing which caused the 'grand shuffling event of 2012 at mossy shed' to even start in the first place.

so there it is, avoiding the midday heat, i will take the plunge with lenses, labels and yes, yes, i will take the plunge with tackling at least one pile of 'jumbly bumbly' for if i do not do so now, it could spell disaster for when i don my new specs and immediately trip up due to 'piles' lurking in the 'blurry side bits' of my new specs.

Monday, August 13

yesterday little olive mentioned as things were becoming tres bright out in the back yard she was thinking of saving up her pocket money and splashing out on a pair of those doggie sun goggles she has noted other doggies have. i did inquire how she knew about such things as i do not recall her venturing far from mossy shed and its back yard. she then informed me she had seen them on the world wide web. i inquired no further.

however, i did agree upon seeing her struggling with the glare out back later that day, perhaps she had a point.

i also agreed with little olive this would be a worthy picture to add to her growing portfolio of shots for when 'fame and fortune' comes a knocking and she will be packing her suitcase and heading to where the sidewalks are paved with gold and a little doggie can make it big. we have decided to add this to the section under the heading 'thriller or crime' movie. later this evening i am going to show her a still from Clint Eastwood and Pale Rider so she can see just how far she has come in perfecting her different acting faces.

in the meantime we both agreed after a brisk 'hoppity, trot' to the park and back this morning before it became tres sweaty, a bath was in order as she was looking a little too 'off white' and her hankie was decidedly gray. little olive is not fond of baths (putting it mildly), but realizing she must be at a her best at all times just in case the phone call comes through from a casting director and she might have to drop everything and leave that moment with no time for washing, a bath was a necessary evil for today.

whilst we wait for the call, i am doing a spot of embroidery and reflecting on pesky squirrels who do not care for their tree to be doilified and will not tolerate such nonsense and will indeed do something about it. little olive on the other hand, will continue to sun herself out back , however wisely keeping her eyes closed until her sun goggles come in the mail

Wednesday, August 8

this past weekend it was tres hot. i do not fair well in tres hot weather and thus i wilted. upon hearing from my adopted auntie i now realize there is a term for such occurrences in one's body's reaction to extreme heat. i had become a slug, a slug with an extremely frizzy coif. as i lay in my slug like existence on the floor with fan pointed directly at my clammy body, a thought came to mind. surely upon all surelies, this sort of heat is tres peachy for making doily bowls. i was overcome with a sudden urge to discard my slug like behaviour but alas, i did not have the strength. so i hatched a cunning plan, laying there, fan blasting away and sounds of the olympics coming from the other room where my man was not in a slug like state but very alert and active for one who had turned 45 that day, i noted.

a little squiffy

my cunning plan involved waiting till dusk, temps lowering somewhat to a point where i could lift my limbs once again. i mustered all i had, i knew i had no choice for now was the time to strike if ever a doily bowl was going to be made. i looked deep inside of me and i channeled my inner olympic athlete, (the one who just sitting on the couch watching telly a few days prior, suddenly got a foot cramp observing the track events). with all my strength i hurdled over the 'hop hop hop' board at the bottom of our stairs (to keep pesky short legged doggies from being pesky to cats upstairs), i took the flight of stairs at a speed a slug could only dream of and then a tight lefthand corner to my ransacked studio (reason for ransacking-ness will be revealed at a later date). there i rummaged around for willing doily victims and headed back downstairs to the kitchen to perform the doily deed. i marveled as i stood by the kitchen island, (once again trying without success to tame back the growing frizz a-top with a million bobby pins), how athletic i could be when overcome by the desire to dabble with doilies...

after a happy while, i took my doily bowl outside and placed it perfectly where i knew the hottie in my yard, Mr Sun, would do his thing the following morn (please see below if you wish to know the nitty gritty of how i made my doily bowl). i went to bed with my fan (the plug in sort, not the other) and the very next day whilst overcome once again by slug like ways i very patiently waited for Mr Sun to do his thing. by the afternoon with mid 90 temps my doily bowl was cooked! not only cooked but upon inspection i noted it looked suspiciously so much more than just a doily bowl. it could if i so wished become a hat of sorts. i was a little wary to try this out for fear of my frizzy bonce getting caught in the stiff lace and a terrible scene would ensure where my man would have to take the scissors to the whole frightening entanglement and i would be left without doily bowl and without frizzy tresses. so my maturing years of wisdom told me "do not try this Tif". however what they did tell me to try, was making it in to a lamp. without further a-do i did. carefully i snipped a little cross in the base of the bowl, threaded through my handy dandy cord and plug set thingy-me-jig and then using a spiffy colour of thread, did a few natty stitches to keep it all in place.

natty stitches doing their thing

now some may think it wise to find the center of your bowl before snipping, and i believe that is wisdom well used. i did not, therefore my 'doily bowl soon to be lamp shade' had a jaunty little angle thing going on. instead of weeping, i embraced its odd squiffy charms. after which i carefully stitched a short crocheted edging around a bit of the rim and added a rather lovely tag made from some rather lovely ribbon found out and about on a thrifty pottle the week before.

little crocheted edging stitched in place by hand

rather lovely tag made from a rather lovely second hand ribbon find

thinking safety first, i used a low energy light bulb and hung my 'dabbling with doilies' lampshade up, stepped back, and marveled at not only the fact it looked rather peachy but i had managed all that craftiness even in a slug like state.

how marvelous

Tif

footynote:

nitty gritty of doily bowl making

1. i am quite sure there are 'how-tos' on youtube or around the crafty online community which might be worth a ganders first. other folks may use something more sturdy for stiffening the doilies

2. find a pile of old doilies, i used lightweight ones. cover a kitchen chopping board in foil. find a large bowl and cover in cling film (surround wrap) and place upside down on your foil covered board

3. using concentrated liquid starch, pour some into a shallow bowl. take one doily at a time and soak it in starch. be sure to really work the starch liquid into the lace. squeeze out liquid and drape over bowl. continue to add more doilies in this way, layering them over each other, smoothing them out as you go. when you are happy with your doily placement, double check there are no areas of doily which missed the starch solution.

4. place your doily bowl somewhere safe to dry, if Mr Sun isn't shining it could take several days to harden. do not be impatient, it is tres important it is completely dry. after which slowly and carefully ease off your doily bowl from the cling film and if any areas on the inside are not quite dry, leave a little longer.

5. starch can dry flaky, if this is the case, just blow on the odd bits and they should come off. as i said before, i am sure others have perhaps found better liquids to use.

6. leave as-is, perhaps stitch on a few bits here or there. or you can do as i did, make it into a hanging lampshade but do think of safety issues here and you may choose not to put a low energy bulb in but just hang it by a nice thread as a 'faux lampshade' :)

Monday, August 6

last week amongst all the other goings on, i found time to polish my crafty soul. it was not a full on big old polish but it was a rather nice sort of spontaneous sort of polishing. i had not awoken that particular day with any plans to dabble in craftiness, however the plans i did have, required a man and as the man was gone till later in the afternoon i needed to direct my twitchy impatient ways to another victim.

as i stared out my old studio window i found my willing victim. interestingly, i noted my willing victim had been there waiting patiently for over four years. i am guessing i have not looked at it with fresh eyes until this moment because my eyes have been distracted by many other things of late. this i told myself, as my crafty cogs began to turn is what i miss more than anything, the ability to start a day with a head unfilled with 'to-dos' and room for 'getting lost' from reality.

with half its limbs lost last year, i noted with my fresh eyes just how unadorned and somewhat naked my lovely tree was looking. we are surrounded by huge pine trees of every description but only one tree which has branches and a trunk stands in our yard, one tree who was crying out to be doilified as far as i could see.

many many moons ago i was struck by an image i saw online. i am truly talking many moons ago here, probably in the first year of starting to spend time in the world wide web. i believe i found it via the lovely Emma Lamb and it stuck in my head as it took my breathe away and was something so beyond anything i had seen before. as i stood there that morning, i was inspired to make my tree feel a little more loved. i rustled around in my studio for the pile of lace runners i had recently earmarked as 'need to find a new home pronto' and inspired by the incredible lace tree work of Janet Morton (scroll down and click on '2003 linden in lace' to see the tree in all its lacey loveliness), i got to work.

not your imagination, Gladys has indeed being travelling. more on her thrilling voyage from one end of the yard to the other tres soon

i used coloured embroidery thread in an ad-hock way, which is my fabby fav way to stitch lace together and after a few happy hours i stood back to see my tree in her glorious dolified goodness. now of course i know in my heart of hearts it won't stay this peachy for long. alas and alack the hint of a green tint which covers anything and everything outside will have its last laugh. but by then i hope to be prepared with my 'going into fall, crocheted with all the leftover yarn in my stash' snazzy jazzy woolly jacket for my tree. who will have the last laugh now?

"if i go to sleep at nightknowing i have visited my imagination, however fleeting it may have been, then i know i have spent my day wisely"~ Tif

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